


Blueberry Jam

by justhuman



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Antoine Triplett - Freeform, Billy Koenig - Freeform, Ensemble Cast, Jemma Simmons - Freeform, Leo Fitz - Freeform, Post-Season/Series 01, Skye - Freeform, The Playground
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-03
Updated: 2014-07-03
Packaged: 2018-02-07 08:52:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1892862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justhuman/pseuds/justhuman
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the team tries to bond over simulations of old missions, Phil and Melinda have a chance to remember the good times.</p><p>Spoilers through the end of Season 1 with my own speculation about character arcs. (No doubt destined to be Jossed ;-)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blueberry Jam

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Jairissa](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jairissa/gifts).



_** *Now* ** _

 

Melinda turned her head fully, gracefully to have a look at Phil as they walked through the corridors of the Playground. It wasn't a snatched glance with fumbling fingers trying to hide the movement. Phil would have noticed in either case. This was much more respectful to both of them - matching Melinda's preferred direct style and honoring Phil’s insistence that they eradicate secrets and lies. She was concerned and he knew it. He moved a fraction of an inch closer to her. It was subtle, meant to comfort, and it succeeded. He could be discreet when he wanted, and through that discretion, Melinda was allowed to disguise the feeling of pleasure it gave her to have this trust between them - to know that the only person she was close to, was in her corner.

Thus unified, they approached the training area and could hear the voices of their team coming from behind a corner. When she thought of the children, she was forced to admit that she was becoming close to them too. Their purposed synced, both Melinda and Phil stopped and observed.

"This is _blueberry_ jam," Fitz said,almost like an accusation.

"We ran out of strawberry," Billy said.

"But it's supposed to be strawberry, _not_ blueberry," Fitz insisted.

"Does it matter?" Trip asked. "I mean when I read through the scenario the first time briefing, I thought that the flavor would be a key later on. Face it, who would call out the flavor of jam if it wasn't important, but it's just not."

"But it _could_ be," Fitz said, his voice slurring the words just a bit. "I mean we haven't figured our way out of this pickle, now have we? Perhaps it's because we're not considering the fine details of the situation.”

"OK, let's not get our blood pressure out of sorts," Jemma soothed.

"Oh stop being a mother hen; it's just a healthy debate," Fitz snapped.

"Fitz, drop the jam," Skye shouted.

Everyone paused. 

"Thank you, for yelling. I appreciate that unlike certain mother hens, you're not walking on eggshells. 

Skye looked relieved, while Jemma folded her arms over her chest and pursed her lips.

"Even if you are wrong," Fitz concluded.

"Look we've been at this for a while, maybe we _all_ could use a break." Skye said.

Melinda accessed the situation. Skye was standing at a console, which was holding her laptop and a few random cables. The rest of the group was in various positions on top of what appeared to be a black dance floor, but it was much more than that. Projected from the floor and surrounding walls was a wireframe holographic grid of a cafe street scene. It was a logical leap from the tech that Fitz and Jemma used in the lab.

There were about twenty _people_ , all holographic wire frames, except for the four humans. Billy had a towel draped over his arm and was holding a plastic tray emblazoned with the SHIELD logo. Trip was leaning against a holographically generated wall holding a newspaper. Jemma was sitting on a holographic café chair, in front of an equally holographic table that was scattered with real silverware and dishes from the kitchen. Fitz was seated across from her in his wheel chair, face sagging slightly on the left, just like it had been since the incident in the ocean.

“What is this?” Phil asked, startling Billy, Fitz, Simmons and Skye, although Skye covered it pretty well. Trip had been quietly accessing them.

"We're training," Jemma said brightly.

Trip took a few steps forward. "Billy showed us this new program. It's limited, but impressive. It’s a lot like, how at the ops academy, they physically create scenarios in empty rooms.”

“Only better,” Fitz said. “We don’t destroy the place during the scenario and can reset it in forty-five seconds flat.

"What kind of training?" Melinda asked, as she moved around the perimeter, taking in the elements.

"The developers took old mission reports and recreated them, so that trainees could attempt to solve high tension scenarios,” Billy said.

"Yeah, the scenery isn't that fantastic," Skye said, typing away on the console. "But the puzzle is still intact. And now... Now I may have some more insight, or not, into the jam. The mission report had all the drafts and edits secretly hidden. The original description of the jam was, 'a fresh blend of strawberry and rhubarb with an intriguing whisper of lime.'

Melinda turned her back to the group and smiled wide as Phil said, "That sounds tasty."

"I love when I can describe a mission as _tasty_ ," Melinda said.

"See what I'm saying about the flavor thing - who would write that?" Trip laughed.

"On the contrary," Fitz said. "Perhaps these missing details are the reason we've failed to solve this a dozen times."

"Eleven," Jemma said

"Eleven? I swear I counted twelve," Fitz said back

"The walkthrough at the beginning doesn't count.” Doing the seemingly impossible, Jemma turned whiter. She blamed herself for surviving intact and almost took the wheelchair-bound position of Fitz, harder than Fitz. Any word involving motion, like ‘walk,’ or in this case, ‘walkthrough,’ was a trigger for her.

Jemma stumbled on. “That is to say the run through -- but maybe that's not the word I was searching for either!"

"The flavor's not important," May said, rescuing Jemma from herself. 

"May's right," Phil said. "The flavor wasn't important."

" _Wasn't_?" Skye latched right on. "This was your mission."

"And May's," Fitz added. "She knows about the flavor too."

"Excellent!" Jemma said. "Perhaps there's a hint to the solution then-- about how to get out of the hotel without being killed."

"Perhaps there's a hint to what details were omitted from the report," Trip said.

May gave him a pointed look. He was good - a keeper.

"Omitted? What do you mean omitted?" Skye asked.

"Oh come on, Coulson wouldn't leave anything out of a report, would you, sir?" Fitz asked.

" _Just_ Coulson?" May asked with just enough indignation in her voice to make a point. Of course, she didn’t feel like her honor was being impinged. It was just her job to have Phil’s back in all things major and minor.

"Well, I didn't mean anything nefarious by that,” Fitz said apologetically.

"Let's get back to the very obvious solution that something was left out of this report -- perhaps something embarrassing," Skye said, looking from Phil to Melinda.

Yeah, she was a keeper too, despite being a source of difficult conversations.

"I'm sure if you're creative, you'll figure out how to make it out of there," Phil said, and as one he and May turned around.

“Wheels up in ten,” May said.

“We’ve got an O-8-4,” Phil added. 

He moved that fraction of an inch closer to Melinda as they walked. Then turned to her, shook his head and sighed. “Our children may be too precocious for our own good.”

Melinda gave him a smile, remembering exactly how they had gotten out of that hotel alive. “They’ll figure a way out of the hotel. It’ll be more creative than our solution, I’m sure.”

Phil glanced behind him, noting that they were alone. “But not nearly as fun.”

Melinda laughed softly as they fell back into step, and she moved a fraction of an inch closer to him. 

_** *Then* ** _

"Ready when you are," Melinda said, looking adoringly at Phil, who was dressed as well paid accountant from Indianapolis, complete with a gold band on his left ring finger. He was an accountant on vacation, because he wasn't wearing a tie.

Phil smiled back and bit into his toast.

They were in the outdoor dining area of the Grand Hotel Beauvau in Marseille, posing as American tourists on an anniversary trip. Melinda was wearing a short-sleeved blue dress, not too expensive, not too cheap. They, along with some rival spies, were there to retrieve an experimental drug rumored to create some aspects of a super soldier. To add to the potential chaos, a local drug lord was also staking out the hotel, no doubt thinking that the drug had street value as a steroid.

In her ear, Melinda heard Maria. "Roger, Lovebirds. The waiter is coming with the key. We're not the only bird watchers out here, so be prepared to disguise the transfer. Remember, we need to keep this mission under the radar."

"You should try the strawberry-rhubarb jam; it's excellent," Phil said.

"You do this every time there's food in front of us. Watch out, my love, or you'll become too fat and I'll have to trade you in," Melinda said just loud enough that if anyone at the next table was listening at the next table would buy their cover as a married couple on vacation.

Someone barked out a laugh on the other end of her earpiece – probably Natasha.

Phil quirked and eyebrow good-naturedly, and raised his napkin to his mouth. Speaking low he asked, "Is that why you're divorcing your husband?"

Melinda's smile had never been so bright, but inside she's was seething. She had joined the CIA just like her parents had expected. The CIA's unofficial policy was to keep it all in the family. Melinda selected one of the highly suitable single agents that her parents had gone out of their way to introduce her to. It was fun for a while. He was Chinese-American too and could commiserate about having parents with high expectations. He even laughed when she hid rubber snakes and frogs around the house to startle him.

Everything was good until Melinda realized that despite her high mark in training, she was going to be back-burnered as an inside-the-Beltway analyst. Her soon-to-be-ex-husband approved of this, because it would be an easy transition to stay-at-home mommy when it came time to fulfill her parents' expectation of many, many grandchildren. Then Melinda met Nick Fury. It changed not only her job and accompanying job satisfaction, but her life. She really didn't need Phil bring up the divorce.

"Waiter incoming, are you two set?" Maria asked.

"I could get this, honey," Phil said.

"No, no, dear – I've got it." Melinda's smile was very real when she tripped the waiter and a pot of strawberry-rhubarb jam went flying off the tray onto Phil's chest. In the commotion, she reached under the tray, like she was trying to grab it and came away with the key from the waiter's hand.

"No, no," Phil shouted at the waiter, tossing her a glare.

"This is terrible. Our train is a few a few hours and the porters have already taken our luggage to the station. Do something!" Melinda yelled at the waiter. 

"Of course, of course, I'm so sorry," the waiter said.

The maître d' was at their table in a flash. "Madame, Monsieur, I cannot apologize enough for this incompetence. Please, please if you would step inside, we will attend to your shirt."

Phil nodded, and Melinda gave a great sigh of relief. Their waiter was sent away in disgrace as the maître d' fired off commands. In less than five minutes, they were in a suite with complimentary champagne on ice. Phil's shirt was off to the laundry, and he was in a hotel bathrobe at the concierge's insistence.

"I assure you, Monsieur, we will have your shirt cleaned in under an hour – plenty of time for you to catch your train. In the meantime, you and the lady, please enjoy the suite."

"Thank you," Phil said and reached for his wallet, which the concierge begged him not to. With that, the door closed and they were alone, except for Maria in their ears.

"Lovebirds to Nest – we're in," Melinda said. 

"I don't suppose you have an extra shirt, do you, Nest?" Phil asked. 

"No can do, Lovebirds. We think you made it in clean, but that was a little over the top."

"I had it coming Nest." Phil mouthed _sorry_ to Melinda. She shrugged and stood up, dangling the key from the waiter.

"Nest, we're in suite 542. According to the room key we were given, the egg is in 635. I'm going to recon, and if the way is clear, retrieve the egg." 

"Copy Lovebirds."

To Phil she added, "If the staff comes back, you can tell them I'm in the bedroom napping from the ordeal."

Phil put a hand on her arm. "Be careful out there."

"I'm always careful. Besides, picking up the egg is the easy part. Getting it out of the hotel is going to be tougher." She patted his hand and then moved to the door. After checking the peephole, she joked, "I'll see if I can find you a shirt." 

"Hey, wait." Phil dashed over to the champagne and put the bottle on the table. Then he took the bucket and ran to the bathroom. Melinda could hear what she thought must be the ice, hitting the sink or the bathtub. Phil was back in a flash. "Here, a cover story if you need it."

"I don't think a hotel like this has an ice machine – that's what room service is for."

"But we're American, what do we know? I've got your back, May."

She opened the door, checked the hall and let Phil close the door behind her.

*

Purse looped over her arm, Melinda held the bucket in both hands. No one was on the elevator when it arrived, so the trip to the sixth floor was uneventful. Along the way, she could hear Phil quizzing the Nest – asking if they had eyes on the room – if they could tell if there was anyone in side. They had scanners sweeping the room from across the road – it looked clear.

When Melinda stepped out, she could see a lone guard quietly standing in front of the door she wanted. Maybe getting the drugs wouldn't be so simple. She walked down the hall, duteously glancing at every branch and alcove for an ice machine. 

As she reached the guard, she stumbled through _s'il vous plait,_ sighed, and then asked in English, "Do you know where they ice machine is?"

"No."

The accent was Slavic, which fit with what they knew of the drug and its creator. 

"There's no ice?"

The guard looked down his nose at her. "It would be best to go to your room and summon room service."

"Look, my husband has a terrible headache and really needs this. Would it be possible for me to use your phone, so I can order the ice to my room and not lose any time?"

"NO," the guard responded.

In her ear, Phil asked, "Nest, is the room still clear?"

"Affirmative. Lovebird, you have a go."

"Well, I guess I'll just go back. Melinda took two steps and slipped out of one of her heels, pretending to trip. The guard reached over and steadied her arm. She smiled in thanks. When the guard turned back to the door, she kicked off her other heel and slammed the bottom of ice bucket into his head. It wasn't enough to take him out, but it set him off balance enough that bringing him down with feet and fists only took another minute. Quickly, she opened the door and confirmed there was no one in the main room.

"Status, Lovebird."

"Making my entrance now."

"Any trouble," Phil asked.

"Well, the door guard was rude to me, and I'm having none of that today," Melinda said with a smile.

"Don't I know it!"

Melinda closed the door and immediately began searching. "I'm in. Do we have any more detail on where the egg is?"

"Negative."

Halfway through searching the main room, she noticed that the ficus tree was in a plastic pot that was seated in a decorative silver urn. She picked up the tree and found a bag with at least 500 electric blue capsules. 

"Jackpot." Melinda said. "I'm heading back."

Tossing the bag her purse, she grabbed the ice bucket and headed toward the door. Then she stopped and looked at the guard. She smiled.

*

Phil pulled the door open almost too quickly when Melinda knocked. As she came in, he checked the hall behind her and closed the door. "Nest. Lovebirds are together again. You took longer than I expected to get back. I was starting to worry."

Melinda shrugged. "Don't say I never got you anything. She opened her purse and pulled out a white cloth that she shook with a flourish, revealing a shirt.

Phil smiled and stripped off the hotel robe, taking the shirt. "Geez, you could fit two of me in this," Phil complained.

"Bigger they are, the harder they fall."

Phil didn’t reply, he just slipped on his jacket, trying to conceal the bulk of the material. Melinda liked that about him – he never questioned her ability to take on a physical challenge even if the guard was twice her size.

"You have the drugs?"

Melinda held her purse open, showing Phil the capsules. "Nest, do you have an exit route in mind?"

"Level two is laundry and housekeeping. There's an exit to the back of the hotel there."

"Roger," Phil said, as he opened the door and gestured for him to precede him. With a nod, Melinda stepped out. 

Once in the elevator, Phil pulled out a fireman's key and pushed the button for two. When the doors opened, there was the expected scurry of the hotel staff in their livery, but there were also half-a-dozen men, smoking cigarettes and leaning against the wall. 

"Lovebirds, we have movement in egg room."

"See, honey, I told you the lobby was the other button." Melinda pushed the lobby button and the door close button. One of the men pushed off the wall, coming toward them and Melinda and Phil got a look at his shoulder holster.

When the doors closed, Phil put the key in again and sent the elevator heading up. "Nest. The way is blocked."

"By their clothing, I'm guessing local drug gang." Melinda added. "What about a roof extraction?" Roof extractions always caught too much attention, but it could probably get them out. 

"Negative. Hawks on roof. Looking for options."

"Hawks in the lobby too," Phil said, turning the key so the elevator wouldn't respond to calls from the various floors.

"Not to mention the apologetic hotel staff that will want you to wait for your shirt." Melinda shook her head.

"Hey, we were wondering how we were going to get from the restaurant to the guest floors. Don't kick yourself over a shirt – it was a good plan."

"Well three, four and five are our choices," Melinda said, pointing at the elevator buttons.

"On five, we've got a room, maybe there's something in there we can leverage. I've got an idea."

"I'm game, tell me about it," Melinda said.

Phil turned the elevator key and hit the button for five. "First we go back to our suite."

_** *Now* ** _

“6-1-6 – what is your ETA?”

“With this tailwind, two hours. Don’t wait up for us, Billy. After we park, I think we’ll let everyone keep sleeping on the bus.”

“Roger 6-1-6 – clear skies. Playground out.”

“Thank you, Playground. 6-1-6 out.”

Melinda closed the comm link and tilted her head to the left to try and stretch the kink out of her neck. It had been a hard day. They were still trying to find the team balance. She, Phil, and Trip could always fall back on their ops training. It didn't make them a well-oiled machine, but at least the arrangement of parts made sense. The other children did unexpected things.

What Melinda wasn’t as good at was anticipating how good the rest of the team was getting. Melinda had certainly learned that she could count on them and demand things from them. It was just that they were getting better faster than she could anticipate. Phil didn’t seem to have problem, which was good. His complete confidence was what they needed.

Phil stepped into the cockpit, without knocking, without waiting for an invitation. Melinda ignored him, because that’s what she did, even when she was glad to see him.

“Kids are asleep,” Phil said as he took the co-pilot’s spot.

“Even Jemma?”

Jemma had developed a habit of pretending to go to bed only to get up and check on Fitz when she thought he was asleep. 

“Trip and Fitz topped off her glass every time she wasn’t looking. I thought about stopping them, but if anyone on this team can find an effective hangover cure-“

“It’s Jemma,” Melinda finished. “Nice to see Fitz getting used to Trip.”

“Yeah. I think there may be trouble yet between the three of them, but for now Trip and Fitz are both pretty intent on helping Jemma to let it go.”

Melinda looked at him and smiled. “Letting go is a good thing.”

“It is.” Phil agreed. They sat comfortably silent for a minute or two. For Melinda, there was a micro-flash of everything that happened in that building in Bahrain, followed by a longer look at Phil picking her up in the aftermath.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I should have never doubted you were in my corner.”

He had been thinking of more recent times, and how things had collapsed between them. Melinda turned her head to look at him, hoping to find the right words, but instead she got that damn neck twinge again.

“Hey, do you need Jemma?” Phil was on his feet.

“Please, I’ve hurt myself much worse than this – just a muscle strain. What you should be asking is why they worked on getting the holographic grid online before the whirlpool. I could use a- Hey!“

Phil was gently taking off her headset. “I can see you’ve got it on autopilot; stop being tough for a minute, OK?” He didn’t wait for an answer and just started massaging her shoulders. Normally, she’d worry about boundaries and team dynamics, but at the moment, she didn’t give a damn. They had dressed each other’s wounds more time than she could count, and Phil had always been this tactile and familiar.

Melinda sighed and relaxed. “Okay, this is nice, but I still want to soak in the whirlpool.”

“Your wish is my command. I'll put the team on it tomorrow morning – anything to get them off the topic of jam flavors.”

Melinda laughed, “A whisper of lime – you were unbelievable when we were able to eat on a mission.”

“I like food. I got a job where I could travel, try new things.”

“Didn’t mean you had to be the _New York Times_ food critic in your mission reports,” Melinda said.

“You broke me of that, Miss Pass-the-MRE. I’m just thankful that you never incorporated any of the suggestions you told me verbally into the mission report.”

“Those details were important – the kids would have solved the scenario in one, if you had let me add them,” Melinda insisted, although they both new those notes were never destined for the report.

“It would have sounded like a romance novel.” 

“Pfft – Based on that comment, I can tell you’ve never read a romance novel. First off, we were never tragically separated or ready to kill one another. Second, sex scenes in romance novels are tame. I put the ‘X’ in explicit.” Melinda shifted, getting more comfortable, wishing that he’d touch more than just her shoulders. 

“I’ll say.”

Melinda opened her eyes and saw there was red in his cheeks. “Are you embarrassed, Phil? As I recall it was your brilliant plan that let us narrowly escape the trap we had walked right into.”

“Maybe I’m remembering it fondly. It was a good plan.”

Melinda stood up and stepped around the back of the pilot’s seat so she could fiddle with his tie. “It was a lucky plan, but you’re not the only one that remembers it that way.”

He squeezed her arm. “Aren't we too old and responsible for reminiscing like this?”

“I’m not ready to retire, Director Coulson. This is a job for the young, so I think that we are required to be young. Maybe we don't have to do a full reenactment. For instance, I highly recommend that we never have sex with each other or anyone else in full view of a camera ever again – that gets out onto the Internet these days...” Melinda shook her head.

"Agreed, but it was necessary at the time to attract hotel security."

"So they could unwittingly come to our rescue by escorting us out."

"It didn’t stop people from shooting at us outside the hotel."

"Well, that's just a part of the job description." Melinda shrugged. "Maria thought we were being over-the-top but effective again."

“Natasha said she got popcorn. Let me see if I remember how this started.” Phil moved, putting one hand on her waist and using the other hand to take hers. “We were dancing.” He swung them in a wild turn behind the pilot seats, and Melinda smiled.

“We had gone back for that champagne bottle and dropped it all over the floor."

"Waste of good champagne," Phil said.

"But it enhanced our cover of being sloppy drunk.” May tugged on his tie and planted a kiss on his cheek.

“Very, very drunk, like we had no idea what we were doing, but I slapped a lot of buttons and hit the emergency stop." 

"Then I pushed you into the wall," Melinda said.

"Well, I kind of fell into the wall." 

Melinda backed him against the cockpit door. 

"Well, maybe you pushed, because you're a pushy kind of person." He twirled her back into the open space.

"Mmm, I'm pushy? As I recall, your fingers made a foray up my skirt and somehow my panties ended up on the floor next to the champagne bottle."

" _Terrible_ waste of champagne," Phil said. "But I'm not regretting a single thing that happened under your skirt."

"It wasn't just a single thing; you know how to treat a girl, even if you did eventually it the button for the first floor."

"It was nice that the hotel security was there to give us the back-up we needed to get past the drug traffickers. A good plan, except for the champagne."

"I'm glad they didn't take the memory from you," Melinda said, not sure why she was thinking about that right at this moment.

"I'm glad they didn't take the six months after it either. It was six months, right?"

"Six really good months." Melinda agreed. 

Phil's hand slid further around to her back and Melinda didn't resist the gravitational force pulling her in. She could see the smile in his eyes that came from remembering their dance in the elevator, but there was weariness in the lines around his mouth – why shouldn't there be? He was concern for the team, T.A.H.I.T.I., the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D., losing the cellist again. There was also the betrayal he was trying to get past that had happened at her well-meaning hands.

Melinda was struck by how close she had come to losing her best friend. All those tightly bottled emotions were threatening to pour out. She moved both hands around Phil's waist and laid her head on his shoulder so that he couldn't see. 

Where their dance in the elevator had become wilder and wilder, they slowly rocked in a circle to the sound of the bus. Phil's hand rubbed circles into her back. "I'm letting it go – you should too."

Melinda couldn't trust her voice, so she nodded against his shoulder and just held him tighter.

_**End** _

**Author's Note:**

> Many, many thanks to Raine for the wonderful beta
> 
> Thanks also to Shinsengumi, who helped me out when I was looking for a prompt to get started - "this is _blueberry_ jam."


End file.
